


Three Times Bond and Q Trolled Each Other and One Time They Trolled Side-by-Side

by notbeloved07



Category: James Bond (Movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: BAMF!Bond, BAMF!Q, Fangirls, Firefly References, Fluff, M/M, Playful Revenge, Shoddy Journalism, Trolling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-06
Updated: 2013-05-06
Packaged: 2017-12-10 14:40:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/787184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notbeloved07/pseuds/notbeloved07
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On a spur of the moment, Q pulls a troll that gets him caught in a troll war with James Bond. When one of their friends gets slandered, though, Bond and Q have no trouble working together against a common enemy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Times Bond and Q Trolled Each Other and One Time They Trolled Side-by-Side

**Author's Note:**

> Rating is for strong language.
> 
> Many thanks to [Calpuriel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calpuriel) ([micro-excited-geeky-girl](http://micro-excited-geeky-girl.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr) and [Quinnster](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quinnster/) ([graceful-flailings](http://graceful-flailings.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr) for beta-ing.

"No, you overshot, move just slightly to the left," Q said over the comms. 

"Seriously?" Bond asked, taking a small step to his left. Q had been moving him back and forth for several minutes now. 

"Stop. Freeze," Q said. He sent the signal to download the information. "And yes, seriously," he added. "I need to bounce the signal off the satellite. It has to be the precise location." 

Bond didn't say anything, but through a surveillance camera, Q saw him roll his eyes. 

"Are you done yet?" Bond asked as soon as the data stream finished. 

"Not quite," Q said. "Could you hold the transmitter out in front of you, at arms length, facing the ground?" 

Through the surveillance camera, he watched Bond do it--holding the transmitter in his right palm. 

"Good, now could you do the same with the receiver?" 

Bond cast the surveillance camera a glance, but obeyed without a word. 

"Perfect. Now could you turn the transmitter so it's facing up?" 

"Q--" 

"I need to get the signals from all directions." 

Bond flipped his right palm skywards. 

"Now the same with the receiver." 

Bond's left palm flipped skywards, as well. 

Q's mobile vibrated once, so he took it out to check it. 

_The Macarena? Really? -Eve_ , the text read. Q looked over his shoulder at Eve, who was standing right behind him with an unreadable expression. Q gave her his best deer-in-headlights impression. She grinned and gave him a thumbs-up. 

Q took a deep breath to stop from laughing. The next step would be the trickiest. 

"Great, now keep the receiver steady, and move the transmitter so it's facing over your left shoulder." 

"You must be joking." 

Q sighed. "Do I sound like I'm joking?" 

Bond actually seemed to consider this for a few seconds. R leaned towards Q. 

"Q, the signal's getting out of phase," R said into the speaker. "Tell him to move the transmitter already." 

Finally, Bond moved his right palm to face over his left shoulder. 

"Perfect. Signal's coming nice and strong. Now receiver over your right shoulder, please. Wonderful. Now if you could keep the receiver in place and put the transmitter above your head, over your right shoulder." 

Q managed to keep a straight face as he spoke. The same could not be said for the rest of Q branch. 

"Are your minions snickering?" Bond asked, narrowing his eyes. 

"They're _not minions_ , and they're just snickering because of some video of a cat jumping into a box--I'm never sure why they have such a crass sense of..." 

Bond put down the receiver and transmitter and turned to face the camera, crossing his arms. 

"This isn't working for you is it?" Q sighed. He never was good at lying his way out of a bind. 

"This, my dear quartermaster, was a mistake," Bond promised. 

***************************** 

Q was not afraid of Bond, not even when he knew Bond was preparing some sort of revenge, but even so, it didn't hurt to be prudent. He checked everything Bond said to him and kept an eye out for all the other Double-Os as well--it was no secret that Double-O friendships were forged in fire and knew no bounds. 

For months, nothing happened. Everything Bond said checked out. As if he knew that Q was meticulously checking everything, Bond regaled him with more facts about the countries he went to than he normally did. McDonald's in the Philippines sold tuna pies. Public toilets in Japan had wash-lets and seat warmers. For decades now, in Brazil, you could buy cars that run on alcohol, and fuel them up at any station. In Sao Paulo, there was a fixed meal for every day of the week, that was served at all restaurants. 

Q had almost let his guard down--almost, but not quite--when it started. He was sitting in a corner in his favourite café, working on some personal projects when he sensed two people sit down at his table across from him. 

Q looked up. There were two girls--one blonde, one ginger--both of whom would have been pretty if not for the alarming make-up. Neither looked to be older than thirteen. 

"Hey, I'm Tina," the blonde said. "And this is Jessica." 

"Hi!" Jessica said with a nervous smile. 

"So, what are you working on?" Tina asked with a smile, batting her eyelashes. Jessica was twirling the end of her red hair around her fingers. 

Q realised that they were flirting. And really rather badly. But why were thirteen-year-old girls flirting with _him_? 

"Oh, just work." Q said tersely. "Is there something I can help you with?" 

"Could you tell us about the work?" Jessica asked with a hopeful smile. "What is it like working with them?" 

"With whom?" Q frowned. 

"Oh, you know..." Jessica said with a wink. 

"I really don't." 

At this point, Jessica and Tina had a giggly, whispered conversation between them. 

"Okay, we understand your need for secrecy," Tina said finally. She took out a slip of paper. "But here are our numbers, if you change your mind." 

"What are you talking about?" Q asked. 

The girls simply winked and pranced off. Q saw them burst into giggles just outside of the café. He looked at the slip of paper. Q was hesitant to stalk thirteen-year-old girls, of course, but this was just bizarre. The girls' phones were ridiculously easy to hack, since Q already had an IMSI catcher set up for the area, so within minutes he was listening in on the girls' texts and calls. 

What he found made his stomach drop. There were text messages sent to hundreds of recipients--probably all the girls' school friends. 

_omg its real we rly met him_

_in corner of tea house all hush hush abt work_

_cardigan over suit just like he said_

Responses were pouring in, too. 

_when right now?_

_Rly? omg he there now?_

Given the situation, Q decided he had better leave as quickly as he could. Despite having planned to stick around at the café for another hour, he sent R a quick message with the phone numbers and the situation, packed his things up and left. 

He took a circuitous route back to headquarters to make sure nobody was following him. As soon as he stepped into his office, R slipped a tablet into his hands. On the screen was a Telegraph article. 

"The Telegraph?" Q asked with a raised eyebrow. 

"You should read this article," R said, eyes on the tablet. "I think it would explain a thing or two about your current predicament." 

Q looked at the article. It was apparently a sneak interview with the someone named Daniel Fuller, the casting director of the upcoming One Direction film. Q felt an impending sense of dread. 

"No," he breathed. 

"I'm afraid so." 

Q quickly flicked through all the pages of the interview. Thankfully, there were no pictures. He flicked back to the first page and read through the article. 

It was... incredibly well done. It sounded exactly like what Q would have expected an interview with a casting director to sound. Daniel Fuller was grateful that he could work on this film. The One Direction boys were a delight to work with and brought a lot of energy to the casting stage. Even the hints about his personal life were subtly slid in. He liked working in cafés around Vauxhall. He tried not to talk about what he did in public. Yes, he did wear cardigans a lot--cardigans are cool. 

"Um, Q?" R said, interrupting Q's reading. 

"Yeah?" 

"You might want to look at the 'Cardigans are cool' tag on Tumblr." 

"Oh, God," Q breathed, when he did.

"We've managed to stop any photos of you from leaking out, so these are all drawn from memory. But you might want to lie low for a bit." 

"Ya think?" Q snapped. Then he had an idea. "I should call up David. He could at least fix this Tumblr thing for me," he said, gesturing at the screen full of Tumblr posts. 

"David?" R frowned in confusion. "Wait. You mean David Karp? Founder and CEO of Tumblr? Oh, God, you _do_ know David Karp. Is he your little brother? Don't answer that--it doesn't matter. Cyrus owes me twenty quid." 

R walked out, presumably to collect his money from Cyrus, and nearly bumped into Bond, who was supposedly just returning from a job in Sao Paulo. Bond held up the box Q had given him. Both his gun and his radio were still in pristine condition--Bond had accomplished his mission using only a kettle and a piece of piano wire. 

"What the hell, Bond?" Q exploded. "You took this too far!" 

"I'm sorry, what?" Bond asked, innocently offering Q his box. 

"No," Q glared. "I know it was you. And this is not appropriate." 

"Aw, poor quartermaster," Bond said with mock sympathy. "Can do all that damage from your laptop before your first cup of Earl Grey, but can't handle a couple of teenage girls?" 

"You unleashed _rabid fangirls_ at me. There is fanart--fanart!--of me. No, let me clarify: there are drawings of me _having sex with nineteen-year-old boys_." 

"Well, to be fair, they think you're twenty-three, so it's not that creepy. It even passes the over-two-plus-seven rule." 

"That's not the point!" 

"Hey, some of these drawings aren't half bad," Eve said, materialising out of nowhere. She scrolled down the Tumblr feed on the tablet. "They don't quite have your chin right, though." 

"Whose side are you on, anyway?" Q groused at her. 

"Side?" Eve smirked. "Honey, this is like The Prestige, but, you know, in real time. What are you going to do now, Q?" 

"Like the what?" Bond asked. 

"No!" Q snarled. "You are not derailing this conversation. Bond, this is disproportionate. I made you do half the macarena in an empty lot somewhere. You made it so that I can never go back to my favourite café again, if I can even show my face in public at all. I personally built the network security system for that café." 

"First of all, that's not true," Bond said. "This will blow over once the real director of the One Direction film steps out and clears things up. Secondly, there are no photos of you. All you have to do is change your wardrobe and go to different cafes. And lastly, trolls must be repaid with interest. It's the first rule of the MI6 Troll Code." 

"And, to be fair," Eve said. "I was expecting his payback to be a lot worse." 

"Worse than unleashing rabid fangirls?" Q asked horrified. "What could you possibly have expected?" 

"Dunno," Eve shrugged. "More violence and death-like situations, I guess, and, you know, more seduction of Q branchers." 

Bond's jaw dropped in mock offence. "Eve! I would never--that's Rule 14 of the MI6 Troll Code." 

Eve frowned. "Remind me what that rule says?" 

"No troll shall use his or her primary MI6 skill-set in a troll unless the victim is employed by MI6 for the same skill-set. Pretty sure seduction and violence both count." 

_Shit._ That just knocked out about two thirds of the pay-back plans forming in Q's head. He would have to get more creative. In the mean-time, though, he had some calls to make. It was only 8 AM in New York. Would David be awake yet? 

****************************

For a few hours, Q was at a loss for what to do. He had been a notorious troll in uni and had an arsenal of trolls up his sleeve at any moment, but back then, his social circle consisted entirely of technophiles, and hacking was in no way considered off-limits. 

It was only late in the evening, when he had wrapped up all his projects and was sullenly checking the cardigans-are-cool tag on Tumblr that he realised something: Bond was playing with what was essentially an internet sub-culture. 

_Oh, Bond,_ Q smiled to himself. _You think cyberspace is your ally, do you? You merely adopted the internet. I was born in it. Moulded by it. I was a man before I saw the world of 'outside', and by then I needed a glasses upgrade to use the graphics package._ Wait. That didn't sound nearly as awesome as he had planned. He needed to practise his Bane voice. 

He went to a few conservative Christian forums that he'd been trolling for months, and wrote that he lost his faith in God when the love of his life had betrayed him right before she passed away, told them he was looking to find God again, and left them Bond's email address. Then, he hopped over to a Star Wars forum and made a post about a contest for best Chewbacca impressions. He directed the contestants to Bond's phone number, and told them to hold a conversation with the person who answers while in character as Chewbacca. He offered 50 quid for the best impression, and tapped Bond's phone so that he could actually deliver. 

He was still thinking about how best to unleash the power of 4chan on Bond without it backfiring as he made his way home--he knew as well as any that 4chan was a double-edged blade. 

The next day, when he went into work, he found his secretary, Zahra, looking distraught. 

"Q, um, sir," Zahra said. She blushed nearly as pink as her fuchsia hijab. 

"Yes?" Q asked, when she seemed unable to continue. "Zahra, what is it?" 

Zahra handed Q a bunch of envelopes, which had been meticulously cut open along the side instead of along the top, as was Zahra's trademark style. Q pulled out the contents of the envelopes. Each of them contained a cheque. And to the memo of each cheque had been added some variation of the phrase "for sexual favours". 

_For reimbursement for PE4 and explosive sexual favours,_ one cheque said. 

_Bonus for that thing you did with your tongue,_ another said. 

"Here are the ones I haven't opened yet," Zahra continued, still not meeting Q's eyes. 

Q breathed in. He took the remaining envelopes. He breathed out. 

Q sighed. He thought about explaining the situation to Zahra, but where did you begin with things like this? He decided not to bother. 

"Zahra, why don't you take the rest of the day off? Maybe read up a bit on pranks and trolling? I'll sort this out." 

"Thank you, sir," Zahra mumbled before scrambling to get away. 

After Zahra left, Q started setting the stage on 4chan. He was still trawling the site and gauging its mood when Bond strode into his office. He had a rolled up newspaper in his hands. 

"Come to apologise about traumatising my secretary?" Q asked lightly, instantly closing all his windows. 

"Maybe after you apologise for the screaming phone calls and the emails to save my soul, Q," Bond retorted. "And that's not even the revenge you planned is it?" 

"Of course not.” 

"Hm... Call it off." 

"Are you asking for mercy?" Q asked, incredulous. 

"I'm proposing a truce," Bond said, his face unreadable. 

"Why?" 

Bond tossed the newspaper on Q's desk. It was a Daily Mail article--a major exclusive across two columns from the front page, above the fold. About Eve Moneypenny. 

"Al Qaeda Was Given Sensitive MI6 Documents, MI6 Aides Say." 

Q's jaw dropped. "What the fuck?" 

"It gets better," Bond said. "Keep reading." 

Unnamed "administrative officials" were cited as saying that Moneypenny had left Q-clearance documents in a T-clearance photocopy room, while several named agents were cited as saying that she had shot James Bond, one of MI6's star agents. In the continuation of the article, on page 5, there were childhood photographs of Eve with her family just outside of a mosque. From there the article moved on to ridiculous conclusions that Eve had leaked all sorts of classified documents to Al Qaeda. It also went into detail about how Eve had hosted an intern from Egypt who had since disappeared. 

"The photocopy room incident happened the day headquarters exploded," Bond explained. "You know about the shooting of James Bond already. And Eve's family is Muslim, but not fundamentalist. The supposedly missing intern they're talking about is actually studying international relations at Southampton. And even this supposed leak is actually of geospatial data, which we don't even deal with--it clearly comes from the MOD, not MI6." 

"Are any other newspapers reporting this?" 

"Just the Daily Mail for now. The Guardian's trying to scoop-report this, while the Telegraph's scrambling to advance. Both came to us, which is what this Daily Mail bastard should have done, if he weren't too busy breaking stories." 

Q didn't actually understand what some of the words in that sentence meant, but didn't really care. "Is Eve okay?" 

"She's in her office," Bond replied, dodging the question. "Alec's with her." 

Q stood up. "I accept your proposal. Until we take this journalist down, no trolling each other. Deal?" Q offered his hand. Bond shook it. 

Bond opened the door to Q's office and held it for Q before walking out himself. They made their way to Eve's office together. They found Eve was sitting on her desk, staring into space. Alec was sitting next to her with an arm around her shoulder. 

"Alec?" Bond said. 

Eve nodded at Alec, who detached himself from her and followed Bond and Q out of the room. 

"Her family's been moved to a safe-house," Alec said after he closed the door. "They might not have been in danger, but after what happened with the Wen Ho Lee incident, it's best to be sure." 

"So, what do we do?" Q asked after a pregnant silence. 

Alec looked at Bond. "I'm going to kill him." 

"The journalist?" Bond asked. "Don't be an idiot." 

Alec looked sharply at him. "You'd do it if he were slandering Q." 

"What?" Q gaped. 

"And I would have been an idiot," Bond replied, not at all affronted by the allegation. 

"What!?" Q turned sharply to look at Bond. 

Bond ignored Q's confusion and continued to hold a staring contest with Alec. 

"No, what we need to do is to sell him a story so ludicrous the Daily Mail and the media at large would disown him in a second," Bond continued. 

Alec raised his head in comprehension. A slow smile crept across his face as he nodded. 

Bond smiled back at him. "You're the Sheepdog; I'm the Floater. Q can be the Roper." 

"No, I'm Floater, you're Sheepdog. You're Navy. Floater's supposed to be Army." 

"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear the allegation that I can't play Army, and move on to say that the Floater needs to be detached. Sheepdog's allowed to look like he wants to kill the mark, and considering as a minute ago you were saying you wanted him dead..." 

Bond trailed off, but maintained eye-contact with Alec. Q looked from one to the other as the two Double-Ohs held their staring contest. After a few seconds, Alec nodded sharply and looked away, which Q interpreted to mean that Bond had won their telepathic argument. 

"Great, now that you two seem to be in agreement, can anyone let me in on what the hell is going on?" Q asked. 

"Yeah," Alec said, narrowing his eyes. "Are we going to talk about how the guy who's probably never done a multi-part troll is playing the most sensitive part?" 

Bond raised an eyebrow. "He's playing an cocky young hacker with a problem with authority. He'll be fine." 

"Bond," Alec said gravely. "If we fail, if Eve... I'm going to. You know I would." 

Bond softened his eyes. "We won't fail. We'll get her reputation back," he said gently. "And then you can kill him anyway. I'll help, if you want." 

Alec looked searchingly into Bond's eyes. "Thank you, James,” he said, finally. “I. Uh. I should--" 

"Go take care of your girl," Bond said. "I'll fill Q in." 

Once you unravelled the terminology, the job was simple enough. Bond took only a few minutes to explain the plan, and Q's role in it. 

"So, shall we troll together, then, my dear quartermaster?" He asked when he was done. 

"This isn't trolling, right? By the Troll Code, you can't use your primary MI6 skills, and I fully intend to use all the skills at my disposal." 

Bond raised an eyebrow. "You believed that?" 

"What?" 

"There is no MI6 Troll Code, Q. I only said that because your skill-set is more useful for trolling than mine is. Hacking is like a staple of trolling, but if a troll involves seducing a woman and then making her husband's death look like an accident, you're doing something very wrong." 

"It was... a troll within a troll. That's actually not bad." 

Bond smirked. "Every generation thinks it invented the troll." 

Colin Whitman was on a roll. His article had made the front page of the Daily Mail, and he was still pumping out details on what he dubbed 'Moneygate' in his head. He knew he'd twisted a few facts, of course, but who didn't in this day and age, when social media forced traditional media's hand, making them churn out articles in real time.

He was looking through his inbox when one particular email caught his eye. It was from someone called “Trick-or-Treap”.

“Moneypenny leak not what you think it is. Even your MI6 sources don't know. Do not open in public.”

Colin looked quickly over his shoulder before opening the email. 

“MI6 was developing a water-based bio-weapon. See specs attached.”

Colin opened the attachments and found that they were scans of indecipherable specifications. After a few pages, he caught that it was a compound called “Paxilon Hydrochlorate”, that could be released in water.

In about five percent of the population, it would cause blurred vision, hallucinations, short term memory loss, a stampede of pink hippopotamuses... Wait, what? He scrolled back up. Blurred vision, hallucinations, short term memory loss, slowing down of internal organs, organ failure, zombie-like state.

This was ridiculous, Colin thought. He closed the documents and went back to his emails. He did a double-take. All his emails had been read. Why had all his emails been read? He certainly hadn't read them all. He went to his Trash folder. There were emails in there that were certainly trash, but he didn't actually remember deleting. He went back to his inbox. There was an email he had shot a quick reply to. The reply sounded like him, but he didn't remember sending it. 

_Short term memory loss_... He went back to the mysterious email.

“IMPORTANT WARNING:” the body of the email read. “Internal MI6 emails suggest that this compound has already been released into the London water mains. For more information, meet me in room B6 of 3 Vincent.” 

Colin turned off his computer and made his way towards Vincent Street immediately. He moved so quickly that on Vincent Street, he accidentally crashed into a man in a business suit--knocking his own glasses off his face.

“Sorry!” the man said, helping him pick up his glasses.

“No, I'm sorry,” Colin replied. He put his glasses back on and brushed off his shirt, before rushing into the building. Room B6 was in the basement, and he couldn't find the stairs, so he went down a rickety elevator. 

He was standing outside the room, just about to knock when the door opened. A pale, skinny boy in a crumpled black t-shirt poked his head out, looked both ways down the hallway, grabbed Colin by the wrist, and pulled him in, closing and locking the door behind him.

Colin looked around the room. There were what looked like servers stacked on top of each other, covering most of the room. There were also several computer screens, with documents pulled up, including the specs he'd been sent. All around the room, there were stacks of bottled water.

The boy sat down on a chair in front of the screens and started pulling up emails.

“I am Trick-or-Treap,” the boy said. “You can call me Treap. As you have probably deduced, I am a hacker.”

Colin looked at the boy and realised that he couldn't focus on him. He started to feel dizzy.

 _Blurred vision..._ he remembered with a shudder.

“Now, your MI6 sources were very vague on what precisely had been handed over to Al-Qaeda, weren't they?” the boy continued. “Technically what they told you was that it was the keys to our aerial and mapping data via UAVs and satellites. But you know that's not right, don't you? Aerial and mapping data isn't even handled by MI6. So the question is: what documents were actually leaked?”

At this, Treap looked up at Colin. “And the answer is this.” He pointed at the document he had sent in the email. Colin had to bring his face right up to the screen to see it--his vision was so blurred. He took his glasses off to clean them, but it was still blurry when he put them back on.

“And going by the internal emails,” the boy continued, “MI6 suspects that it's already in the water. They're trying to cover it up, because people won't like finding out that a Royal Army research team was even working on paxilon hydrochlorate to begin with.”

“You are trying to tell me that the British Army was developing a compound to zombify millions of people? Don't be ridiculous,” Colin said. 

Colin turned around and strode towards the door. Black t-shirt kid was clearly a conspiracy theory nut-case. And he was getting a migraine. He needed to get back to his office.

“I know how this looks, but listen to me, this is Paul Foot Award and British Press Scoop of the Year, right here.”

Well, if this had half a chance of being true, it would be, but it clearly didn't.

As soon as Colin stepped out of the room, he nearly ran into someone in a business suit again. He closed his eyes and opened them again. He looked at the man's face, his suit, his shoes, and back at the man's face. It was the same man he had run into earlier. The man looked surprised to see Colin. Bright green eyes fixed him with a sharp, calculating look before the man retreated down the hallway and disappeared around the turn.

Colin backed into Treap's room and closed the door.

“Okay. Tell me more.”

“General John McGinnis at Army Headquarters was overseeing the project alongside MI6. Three weeks ago, MI6 agents in Pakistan reported the files as being on Al Qaeda servers. According to MI6 internal research, the break-in at Thames Water Ring Main two weeks ago was Al Qaeda slipping the compound into the water mains. It has since been cleaned out of the mains, but there's still residues in the pipes, as well as in the Thames.”

“But if this has been going on for weeks, why haven't we heard? The hospitals must know, the influx of patients--”

“The pax triggers a delayed nervous system reaction--it takes two weeks to take effect. People will be getting sick any day now.”

Why was Colin having trouble focusing his eyes?

“Why do you need me?” Colin asked.

“To talk to General McGinnis. He can blow me off because nobody would believe me. Do I look like the sort of guy society believes in? For goodness sake, I still have _spots_. But a Daily Mail journalist who was just on the front page? He couldn't blow you off.”

Colin didn't argue with that. The boy took that as assent and typed a few commands, turning on a printer. The documents on the computer started flying out of the printer. Treap put the printed documents in an envelope and picked up a marker.

“The project is called 'Miranda',” he said writing “Miranda” on the envelope. “Go find McGinnis. Tell me what you find. I'll wait for you here.”

It was nearly a two hour drive from London to the Army Headquarters at Andover. Colin got there in the early afternoon, with a quick stop for water (bottled water, packaged before the supposed attack). While at the stop, he looked McGinnis up. The general was a tall, blond man with blue eyes and a sharp smile.

As soon as he got out of the car, Colin saw a flash of blond hair and bright blue eyes. He turned to see General McGinnis himself, walking out of the café. He scurried up to meet him. 

“General McGinnis,” he called. “I am the intelligence specialist with the Daily Mail, and I would like to ask you a few questions about Project Miranda.”

“I have no idea what you're talking about,” McGinnis replied, attempting to brush past Colin.

“Is it true that the British Army has been working on a water-borne biological weapon?”

McGinnis stopped at that, and fixed Colin with a razor sharp look. “Journalists are required to schedule interviews,” McGinnis said. “Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go to a meeting.”

“Yes, of course, I'm sorry sir,” Colin said. As McGinnis tried to side-step him, Colin bumped into him and lifted his ID-badge off his jacket.

With the badge, Colin let himself into McGinnis's office. He looked through the documents until he found a folder with Miranda written across the top. He looked through the papers. He found nearly the same documents Treap had shown him. Treap had been right. He had been right about everything.

Suddenly, Colin heard a rustling sound outside the door. He grabbed the folder, opened the window and jumped out, just as the door was forced open. He made a run for his car, looking back to see that McGinnis had jumped out the window after him. McGinnis caught up with him and tackled him to the ground.

Colin managed to wriggle out of his grasp, but he lost the folder. That didn't matter. He would floor it back to London, where Treap had another copy.

Colin made it back to Treap's flat in just over an hour, managing to lose the cars that were following him along they way. 

“Treap! Oh my God, Treap, you were right!” He called, pushing his way into Treap's flat.

There was so much blood. Treap was lying on the ground, his black t-shirt torn from repeated knife slashing. There was blood covering his pale skin and pooling around him. All the servers around had been moved, and there was a superconducting magnet brought into the room--it didn't take a large leap to conclude that the hard drives had been degaussed.

“Oh, God.” 

He looked around the printer, and found the envelope Treap had put together with “Miranda” written across it was still there. He was just grabbing the envelope when he sensed a movement in his peripheral vision. He looked over to see the man in the suit from earlier. With a knife in his hand.

For the second time that day, Colin ran for it. He grabbed the documents and sprinted to his car, constantly looking back to check if he was being followed. When he was sure that he wasn't, he considered driving back to his office to print this on the Daily Mail, but the Daily Mail only came out once a day, and he wasn't sure he could stay alive for that long. He needed this on air immediately. He decided to go for the BBC. Having once worked an intern-ship there, he knew plenty of ways to sneak in and get on air.

“I need to get on air,” Colin announced, barging into the broadcasting room.

*******************

“I need to watch that again,” Eve said, sitting on Alec's lap. Alec restarted the the youtube video of Colin Whitman being dragged off air by the police.

_“But I have evidence of this! I have specification of the drug and research on the effects!” Colin yelled, opening the envelope._

_“Is this the screenplay of Serenity?” the reporter he was arguing with asked, picking up the papers. “I didn't know you were this into Firefly. Miranda? Paxilon Hydrochlorate? McGinnis? Isn't that the Alliance marshal from Arial?”_

Q hummed. On his laptop, he was re-watching his favourite part of the incident--the initial email scene where he modified Whitman's file as Whitman read them.

“How _did_ you do that pink hippopotamuses thing?” Bond asked, looking over Q's shoulder. “Changing the file while he was reading it?”

Q smirked. “He opened a PostScript file I sent him. Opening a PostScript file is game over. I mean, did you know that that language is Turing-complete? Never open an attachment from anyone you don't know.”

“Duly noted,” Bond said.

“Good to know,” Alec said at the same time.

“You two didn't know that already?” Eve asked. “Well, I guess M and I are the only ones who write you emails, anyway.”

“Alec,” Bond said, reading through the news on Whitman. “It looks like Whitman is being remanded in custody. If you still want to... you know.”

“I think I'll be okay,” Alec, still smiling at the screen.

“What is he talking about?” Eve furrowed her brow.

“Nothing,” Alec said. “I'm exhausted. Do you want to head back?” 

“Sure,” Eve said, sliding off his lap. “I may want to stop by my parents' place on the way back.”

“Of course,” Alec said.

Q looked to Bond after the two love-birds left. 

“So,” Q said bluntly, “earlier today, when Alec said that if the journalist had slandered me, you would have killed him...”

“That's not technically what he said...”

Q looked at Bond over the rim of his glasses.

“It was a small breach of trust on Alec's part,” Bond said, not looking at Q. “But it was a high-stress situation, so I forgive him for it.”

“Bond. Do you mean what I think you mean?”

“Do you wonder how I pulled the One Direction casting director troll? I can't just hack their computers the way you can, and I already told you that I didn't seduce or force anyone.”

“How did you?” Q had wondered, but there had been no time to ask in between yelling at Bond and planning revenge.

“I became a freelance journalist for the Telegraph. It took months--I wrote Telegraph articles for months just to get to you. Do you think I'd do that for anyone?”

“Wow. You could've just asked me out,” Q said, a smile dancing at the edge of his mouth.

Bond laughed.

“Okay, maybe not,” Q conceded, joining in the laughter.

“Dinner, tomorrow, seven?” Bond asked.

“Sounds like a plan.”

*******************

Epilogue: Two weeks later...

 _Bored._ Bond texted from Bangkok. It was just past 2 AM in London, which meant that it was just past 8 AM in Bangkok. Bond would be waiting at the airport. 

_You mean horny?_ Q replied. 

_..._ Bond responded.

 _Sorry, silly question; you're always horny._

_You not going to help?_ Bond asked, and Q could just imagine the shy smirk on his face.

 _Fine. I'll bite. Where are we?_

_We are huddled together in the Atacama desert. The temperature is nearly freezing at night, even though it is summer in Chile, so I have my arms wrapped firmly around you to keep you warm._

_Where are your hands?_ Q asked.

 _I am behind you, with my hands reaching around you to hold your wrist and your biceps. I am resting my head on your shoulder. You can feel my heart beat against you as we gaze at the hazy band of stars across the night sky. It is a new moon tonight and there is no electricity within a hundred klicks, so our faces glow faintly pink in the reflection of the nebulae surrounding the Great Rift of the Milky Way. We are admiring the dark clouds amidst the pink and golden nebulae, where stars are born, or were born millennia ago._

That was when Q saw where this was going: Bond had been trying to encourage him to go out to less inhabited areas--deserts, rural areas without electricity, the like--ever since he'd learned that Q had never seen the Milky Way.

Bond's intention here wasn't to sext. Well, then. If he wanted non-sexting, he'd get non-sexting. 

_Suddenly, we hear a sharp squeak-like cry followed by approaching galloping hooves. There is a herd of llamas charging at us._ Q wrote. 

_We remember that llamas don't have hooves and realise that these are mutant llamas._ Bond wrote back, without missing a beat. 

_Keen to investigate who is creating these llamas, we decide to infiltrate the nearby military research base._

_Oh God, no. We are NOT role-playing spy games in Chile while I wait for a flight after a mission in Thailand._

_Damn. I had the plot all planned out and everything._

_Fuck you._

_You would have had more luck with that approach._

_*will have more luck*. Some day I will show you what a night sky is supposed to look like._

_We shall see. Have a good flight._

Q chuckled to himself. He wondered if it was too late to try to have a normal, troll-free relationship. He wondered if he cared.

**Author's Note:**

> The final troll that Alec, James, and Q pull on the journalist is inspired by Season 2 Episode 5 of Leverage, The Three Days of the Hunter Job.


End file.
